Completed in 2011, You're Next is a film that traveled the festival circuit quite heavily before getting an actual release a couple years later. This resulted in a lot of positive buzz and hype from those that caught it during its run. Being a fan of home invasion/masked killer films I had some high hopes going in, although still acknowledging that most buzz that comes from festival runs are almost always exaggerated. That's pretty much the case with You're Next--a fairly mediocre home invasion slasher that seems to expect a majority of its viewer to ignore its terrible script in favor of a few gory deaths.

The story revolves around an estranged family that decide to get together one night at their secluded mansion home only to find themselves being killed off mercilessly by unknown animal-mask-wearing assailants. However, the killers will soon discover that one of the new additions to the family isn't quite so easy to kill thanks to her paranoid father and a strange upbringing. If you mix The Strangers with The Aggression Scale, you'll get You're Next, because that's essentially the best way to describe the flick.

Aside from the surprisingly killing-efficient heroine the film doesn't really offer a whole lot that we haven't already seen. There's some dark comedy randomly thrown amidst all the murder and semi-gory deaths, but thanks to the really poor script, it's hard to ignore some blatant plot-holes and character issues. Like for instance how while everyone's getting attacked they think it's a good idea to leave one helpless family member alone upstairs or how they fail to acknowledge that the killers have made their way inside the home until much later on. You'd think that'd be important information to relay to others ASAP. Other characters just seemingly go missing at times without much reaction from others.

I could go on and on, but the fact is we don't really see these types of movies for their incredible scripts anyway. Sure the movie is sloppy at times, but I had fun with it to an extent. The heroine was pretty badass and some of the deaths were fairly creative. As far as home invasion flicks go, this is one of the better ones. However, I can't ignore the terribly predictable "twist" towards the end though; ugh, so bad *shakes head*.
If you ignore the terrible script then you'll probably find yourself liking You're Next to a certain extent. The pacing is strong and it delivers some decent deaths along with a surprisingly badass heroine, but there are just so many logical issues with the movie. Either way, as far as home invasion flicks go it's one of the better ones, but as a horror film in general it's nothing special. In the end it's a decent effort and watch on a dull late night.

Author Information

FrighT MasteR is an avid horror fan / monster hunter extraordinaire, who created and has been running UHM since its inception, way back in 1999.

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